This invention relates to the testing of telecommunication apparatuses and more particularly to testing devices used in testing telecommunication switching and signaling systems.
In a telephonic testing environment, simulated telecommunication test devices communicate with designated switching and signaling systems. The various switching and signaling systems are tested to determine their operational performance under certain telephonic events. In conventional testing devices, simulators are employed. Simulators are collections of state machines that simulate the behavior of external devices which communicate with the system under test (SUT), such as a telephonic switching and signaling system. Simulators are generally seen as a computer program in which a computer generated model represents an external device, system or process.
Simulators are designed to model the correct behavior of external devices or network entities (such as switches, data bases, telephone sets, wireless base stations, etc.) as observed by looking into the device through a communication link from the system under test. For example, in a GSM (Global System for Mobile Communication) environment, to test telephonic network entities in a laboratory environment, engineers must obtain the Abstract Syntax Notation One (ASN.1) specification for a particular telephonic device. ASN.1 is the Open Systems Interconnection (OSI) standard language to describe data types and includes the messaging standard specification (protocols and programming languages) for telephonic devices.
Unfortunately, in known testing systems, the engineer is required to perform the tedious task of manually writing such simulation programs conforming to protocol to simulate the behavior of certain external telephonic devices.
In known telecommunication testing scenarios, a systems test programmer is required to design and implement a protocol message either manually or with the use of a complier. Subsequently, test scenarios are manually developed to verify that tool development is successful and to test the device or system under test. Once again the testing personnel must manually write many various commands or test scripts to send messages in accordance with the specification of the particular telephonic device to the system being tested. Additionally, the testing personnel are required to know the particular messages which are supported by the system under test (SUT) and the commands which trigger the messaging between the simulated telephonic device and the SUT. Finally, a user guide must manually be developed to document the content of the messages supported by the SUT and to document which commands trigger the messaging.
Disadvantageously, the manual process of testing telecommunication devices in using such known approaches is extremely tedious and time consuming. Also, the known manual approach for testing various telecommunication devices has been found to be prone to much human error which is introduced when generating designs, code, user documentation and test scripts by hand. Unfortunately, known methods of testing have been found to be lengthy and take months of effort to deliver an ASN.1 related feature. Therefore, there is a need in the art to quickly, accurately and efficiently test telecommunication systems and for generating user documentation in an automated fashion.